Ciontacht
by Nightscrawlearth
Summary: Adam Kilduff's discovery of his abilities.  AU
1. Chapter 1

Just an average day. The weather was average for that time of year - a little milder, perhaps, but in the perpetual summer that was Adam's childhood he barely noticed. He was twelve, the sun was just rising and he and his dad were going fishing on the lake.

Adam was an average lad. He lived in a small village in Gaelic-speaking County Galway in Southern Ireland. He was average height and build, with short blond hair and grey eyes. He did pretty well in school, had the usual amount of friends and was considered a genuinely helpful boy. He didn't swear, he said his prayers and went to Mass every Sunday and his family were rarely troubled.

Recently, Adam had been having unexplained fevers, odd migraines that often resulted in him vomiting blood and odd bleeds. He'd swung from anaemic to apparent haemophilia to 'sticky blood' in the space of a few weeks. This was not average for the guy, and the doctors passing around words like 'strokes' and 'tumours' troubled his parents, though not as much as the word 'mutant' that was becoming heard more and more often.

But Adam didn't know about that. He just knew that he was sick, and trusted in the doctors to make him better. And that today, him and his dad were pushing out the boat onto the glass-smooth water of the lake with their rods and boxes inside it, and they were going to fish until the sun was well up.

...That was the plan, anyway.

"Are you sure you want to do this, Adam?" Shane Kilduff looked at his son, frowning a little. The boy was pale, eyes bloodshot (the latest in the long list of weird things was that he'd started crying blood) and a little shaky on his feet.

"Yes, Daid." Adam grinned at him. "I've been looking forward to this for a whole week. I feel fine!"

"So long as you're sure, boy." Shane smiled. "First sign that you're not well, though, you just tell me. The lake's always going to be here."

"'Course, Daid." Adam nodded. His father couldn't help but notice that even in this thin light, the boy was squinting, rubbing at his forearms again.

-Last Week-

"...Can't find any causes for this." The doctor sighed and took off his glasses, polishing them distractedly on his coat. They were in the hospital yet again, Adam hooked up to blood bags again. He'd started bleeding badly from his arms, with no sign of injuries except for an odd hardness forming along the underside of his arms. "It's almost as if something wants him to bleed to death."

There was a dry sob from Keira before she could stop it, a shaking hand pressed against her lips. "I'm sorry, doctor, I just-"

"I understand, Mrs Kilduff." The doctor gave her a smile, replacing his glasses. "Have you given any thought to my theory yet?"

Shane looked at Keira for a moment. "The mutant one?" He sighed, rubbing his eyes. "We can't think of anything else...like you say, this is...impossible. But there's no family history or...trauma..."

"It's a possibility that the onset of puberty can trigger a manifestation of this...X-gene." The doctor ran his hand through his hair, fidgeting with Adam's notes on the table in front of him. "There's been documentation of occurrences, after all."

Shane and Keira looked at each other again. "Well...if he's a mutant, we don't care. He's still our little boy." Keira mumbled. "But...why's it doing this to him? It's killing him!"

"That...I don't know." The doctor glanced through the window of the door, behind which Adam lay unconscious, a nurse changing already blood-soaked sheets. He's almost sweating blood...how is there even any left? "All we can do is keep this up until he stabilises or..."

"Don't even think it." Shane cut in. "God wouldn't let him die."

-Present-

Despite how pale and...ill the boy looked, he had no problem hauling the boat onto the runners. In fact, Shane was pretty sure that Adam could probably pick up the entire thing by himself and walk to the water with it. He'd noticed that the twelve year old had been...changing physically since this started - his ears were far more pointed, he was sure, and his eyes were lightening, not to mention the sheer strength he'd felt in his grip sometimes.

If Adam survived this, Shane was looking forward to seeing just what the boy would become. Even Keira was excited, both of them determined to do everything they could to see the boy through this.

"Daaaaiiid, you're day-dreaming again. Fish aren't going to catch themselves!" Adam waved his hand in front of him, grinning happily. "Come on."

"Alright, alright." Shane laughed, helping push the boat into the water and climbing in beside the boy. "You want to row or should I?"

"You row. My arms hurt."

"No, you're just lazy." Shane smiled gently as he pulled on the life jacket, Adam doing the same and poking his tongue out at him. He grinned back, picking up the oars and pushing them out into the lake.

Adam wasn't feeling too good by the time they got home, despite the brace of fish he and his father had caught. His eyes stung, everything was too loud and he could swear he could smell everything. The all-too-familiar sick feeling had settled in his stomach again, and his sight was oddly reddened.

"Daid...I don't feel so good again..." He murmured, trying to swallow the lump in his throat as he pulled his coat off - and sure enough, there was a slight tint of blood when he wiped his forehead. "Oh...not again..."

His father was there, holding a cool cloth to his burning skin. "Hey, shh, Adam." He murmured as Adam hiccuped, tears rolling down his cheeks, leaving bloody trails. "It's okay." His dad picked him up, calling for his mother. "Keira! Get the doctor, it's started again."

"Dad...I'm scared..."

Shane took him into the kitchen and started to strip his clothes off him. "Don't be, kiddo." He smiled at Adam, but the boy could...smell? Yes, that was the word...smell the panic on him. "It's going to be alright." By the time he'd pulled off Adam's clothes, the cloth was drenched in blood, and he sat the naked boy down on the floor. Adam sobbed, clinging to his father as his mother came in.

"Oh...my boy..." Keira murmured, kneeling beside him and pulling him close, despite the blood. "Jesus, you're burning up. Get some cold cloths, Shane, doctor will be here in a few minutes with the ambulance again."

Adam curled up as his head started pounding. He was literally burning up, temperature spiking far more violently then it had done so far. "I-I don't...don't feel good..." He sobbed, trying to clear his eyes of the redness. It felt like he had liquid fire in his body, that at any moment it might explode out of him. "Mam - Daid - I-I'm scared, I-I'm gonna die aren't I?"

Both of them wrapped their arms around him as both pain and temperature contiued to climb and then-

The world turned red, suddenly. Everything slowed. The pain seemed to detach itself as the twelve year old suddenly felt the blood, a thought stopping it, slicking it off his skin. He could...could control it, reach out and touch the actual energy in it, manipulate it-

And then the heat suddenly spiked and the control went. Pain shot through him, agonising, and he could barely hear the screams over the pounding rush in his head, doubled over and vomiting. Then everything went black as he once again fell into unconsciousness.

When he came to, it wasn't to the normal pristine of a hospital ceiling. It was to a nightmare, a room plastered with blood and worse, parts of the body that should have never seen daylight. Adam stared at the walls, the ceiling - everything was covered, except him. The heat was unbearable, flames licking the walls and turning the gore black, the smell of roasting meat surrounding him.

His father's wrist watch lay in a mess of flesh next to him.

Adam screamed, and that was when the house collapsed around him.


	2. Chapter 2

This time, when he woke up, it was to the white of the hospital ceiling. He was groggy, eyes blurry and painful, his throat and chest burning as he breathed through a mask. His entire skin felt too tight and tender, his head pounding harder than the drums in the pub his dad took him to sometimes.

His dad...

Adam stared at the ceiling for what felt like hours, trying to work out what had happened this time to land him there. He could smell the plastic and the ozone of the oxygen mask acutely, oddly enough his mind concentrating more on how odd the sensations in his body were than on what he was doing in a hospital bed again.

His arms felt...heavy, stiff almost, and he could feel every inch of cloth on his skin. If he wasn't so doped up, the feeling would have been unbearable, but as it was-

-unbearable heat, washing over him as the flames reached out to him, his eyes fixed on the watch, screaming over and over again-

The image was sudden, too detailed to be a nightmare and Adam was screaming, his voice cracked and hoarse and barely above a whisper. Just as suddenly as it had come, the image disappeared, replaced with the sound of a doctor and a nurse bursting into his room, one quickly moving to hold his arms while the doctor leant over him.

"Hush, hush Adam, it's alright, you're safe. You're okay." The doctor murmured. "It's alright, you're okay here. This is the hospital you came to last week, remember? I'm the same doctor you saw...that's right, good lad." Adam had curled up, clinging to him and sobbing weakly. "Good lad...you in any pain?"

Adam shook his head slightly, hiccuping weakly, the outburst taking what little energy he had left. The doctor pushed him back gently.

"That's good. You have damage to your throat and chest, my lad. Don't try to talk at the moment, it'll only hurt. Just rest, hmm? Can you do that?"

A well of terror rose up at the thought of what else was waiting for him when he closed his eyes. Adam shook his head, coughing again. At a look from the doctor, the nurse went to get something. "You need to sleep, Adam. We've got something to help you with that, and it'll mean no nightmares. Would you like that?"

The twelve-year old nodded. A few seconds later, he barely felt the needle, and was asleep before the nurse pulled it out.

"You poor bastard." The nurse sighed, tidying away the needle. "What do you think it was, doctor?"

"At this point? I don't want to speculate." He sighed. "We're going to have to tell him about his parents when he wakes up properly...and try and make sure those police don't trigger anything."

"Hah. Easier said then done, sir." The nurse sighed. "I'll go sort these out and then come back. Poor little mite needs someone to stay around." 


	3. Chapter 3

Adam stared at the floor, bright blue eyes picking out the detail in the sterile blue lino - the little flecks of grey, odd bits of white and flickers of red that looked oddly like blood spatters. He felt numb, cold, though he was wrapped up in blankets and almost dwarfed by the pillows supporting him.

"Adam?"

The gentle voice made him look up, blinking slowly. She was a psychologist, he'd been told, someone who sat with him just to make sure he was alright. Today she was with him because of the two police sitting on the other side of the bed, and he'd been told that all he had to do was say the word and she'd make them leave.

Adam very much wanted everyone to leave.

The boy was still breathing through a mask. He'd inhaled a lot of hot smoke, and the screaming had aggravated it, so the doctors were trying to give his lungs as much help as they could.

"The question, Adam...do you want to answer it?"

Adam's eyes went to the policeman, then the hands twisting in the bed. "C-can you repeat it?" He half-whispered.

The policemen exchanged looks, before one shifted with a creak of leather. "Can you remember what happened before the fire, Adam?"

The boy stayed looking at his hands, fingers exploring the soft texture. They'd got him special blankets, after realising he couldn't stand the texture, using the same material they used for the premature babies.

"Um..."

"You don't have to answer if you don't want to, Adam." The psychologist smiled at him.

Adam shook his head slowly. "N-no...it's okay. W-we went fishing and...when I came back in I wasn't feeling well and Daid..." He paused, waiting for the painful, constricting lump in his throat to disappear so that he could breathe again. "He...was hugging me...and Mam...and it all went h-hot..." His hands twisted the blanket harder. "I-I passed out. I-it happens sometimes..."

"Yes, we've read your notes." The other policeman nodded. Adam didn't like him. He could smell the alcohol through the mask. "You've been ill for some time, haven't you, Adam?"

Adam nodded, fingers going back to petting. "The doctors don't know what it is though."

"Mmm." The policeman sat back, frowning. Adam didn't like that. "Did you and your parents have any difficulties, Adam? Any...arguments, disagreements?"

"No." Adam shook his head, willing the lump to go away again. "Never did."

"None at all? I find that hard to believe."

Adam swallowed, sniffling, keeping his eyes on the bed. "I loved my p-parents." He croaked, the lump becoming a hard ball of lead as he fought against the want to curl up under the blanket and cry like a baby. "A-and they loved m-me."

"I think that's enough of that line of questioning, officer." The psychologist interrupted, giving the officer a hard stare. "Please be reminded that Mr Kilduff is only twelve and recently suffered the tragedy of losing his family. He is suffering from shock, and I'd rather his mental state was kept on a level."

Adam hiccuped, a tear escaping. He wiped it away quickly, the smear of blood bright against his hand as the psychologist handed him a tissue quickly, but the police had already seen it.

"Adam...are you a mutant?"

Adam looked up then, bright blue eyes bloodshot. "I don't kn-know. But I didn't kill them! I love Mam and Daid, why'd I want to kill them?" Oh god, they thought he'd done it, didn't they? They thought he'd actually...that he'd caused the mess and the fire and...

...And what if they were right?

"We don't think that, Adam." The first officer tried to reassure him. "The fire was started by super-heated liquid, probably from an outside generator short-circuiting, and it caused a fireball."

We didn't have a generator...

The moments before he'd woken to the gory room played through his head, the heat and the feelings...oh god, he'd felt the blood, every single heartbeat, not just his own - his parents too. The memory seemed to slow down until he could name every smell, every sound, the rush of blood-

"Adam? Adam, can you hear me? Oh hell- you, get that button beside you, and you - help me lie him down, gently now-"

"Is it just me or is it getting hot in here?"

-Yes, it was, he could remember reaching out to the feeling, the heartbeats taking over his entire world and-

And the heat had gotten out of control, rocketing. He'd tried to catch it. He'd tried, so hard - but it had been too late, he didn't even know how to, where to begin. And then the heat had become fire and his parents were dead and it was all his fault, he was a murderer, he'd killed them-

Adam started screaming hoarsely on the bed as the full weight of the flashback hit him, the feel of the gore under his hands as he'd reached for the watch and the heat of the fire as it reached for him. The policeman that was trying to lie the boy down suddenly let out a bellow of pain, stumbling back and staring at his hands. One had a neat hole in the palm, and the other was missing two fingers from where he'd been holding the boy's wrists.

Two 'blades', apparently made from bone, had snapped out of his underarms, covered in a sheen of blood from where they'd broken the skin.

The psychologist was trying to hold him down as the boy thrashed, sweat pouring off her. "Where the hell are the emergency team? Hit the button again." She looked up to where the second officer, the one who'd asked if Adam had had problems with his parents, was staring in horror at the crying, writhing boy. "Officer! Hit the button!"

"He's a mutant..." The officer muttered, before doing as he was told, pulling off his jacket as he did. He'd gone white and was shaking badly.

The other policeman was curled up in a ball around his hands, sobbing in pain as the doctors slammed into the room, one going to the injured policeman and another managing to catch the psychologist as she collapsed. "We're going to need tranquillisers." One of them muttered.

"On it. Three mil." One doctor held Adam down as another slid a needle into his arm, the drip being held up. "No effect. Try five."

"Still no effect. He seems to be absorbing it too fast."

"Adult dose then."

"Are you sure?" The doctor looked at the restraining one, who suddenly backed off as a blade took a chunk out of his coat. "...Holy shit. Get on the radio, we need restraints."

It was a hectic ten minutes as they got Adam restrained - barely, he broke three before he finally tired - and they ended up administering three times the adult dose of the calming drug before he finally quietened, sobbing gently, eyes half-lidded and oddly blank. The uninjured policeman had collapsed, twitching, bleeding from the nose and ears, and the one who'd taken the blades had been taken down to surgery.

The doctor who'd treated him the first day looked down at Adam with a sigh, the restrained boy staring back at him and breathing slowly. "You poor little sod." He murmured, before pulling on a set of gloves and dragging a chair over, picking up a box of surgical wipes and starting to clean the blades. "I don't care what happened in that house, Adam. You're not to blame for something you can't control."

Adam just continued to stare at the doctor, not giving any signs that he could even hear what the doctor was saying.


	4. Chapter 4

"Adam? Adam, you're zoning again."

Adam shook himself, blue eyes fixing on the woman he was with before sliding off her face. "...Sorry." He murmured, looking around at his surroundings. Oh yeah...they were clothes shopping.

Nothing had been savable from the fire. The house had been completely gutted, nothing left, and declared completely structurely unsound. He didn't even have any photos left any more.

Unfortunately that meant no clothes for him as well. He was currently in a borrowed pair of jeans that were three sizes too big for him and a jumper that made him look more like a child, not helped by the bandages he still wore around his arms and hands. Although no lasting damage had been done by the fire, his skin was still incredibly tender.

"I was asking what sort of clothes you would like, Adam." The woman smiled at him. She was his social worker, the person taking care of him while he recovered in the hospital before he'd go...somewhere. He didn't know where - he had no other family to take care of him, no other possible guardians, but he'd be taken care of, he was sure.

"Um..." He shivered - not from the cold, the jumper was made out of rough, scratchy wool and was grating across his skin. "Soft." He said quietly.

The social worker nodded as they walked. "Any particular colour? Style?" She glanced down at the boy, who was walking with his bandaged hands in his pockets and shoulders hunched. "Do you want the same style as before-"

"No."

The woman looked quickly at Adam, who seemed to shrink into himself. "Adam?"

The boy shook his head. "No, I...I want something different..." He chewed his lip. "C-can we just...look around?"

In the end, after a couple of hours shopping, the two sat in a coffee shop at the back surrounded by bags. Adam picked at his new top - a long-sleeved red and black striped jumper - and smiled a little. It was as far from what he used to wear as he could get, and it felt...comfortable.

No memories attached.

"Adam?"

Adam looked up, blue eyes wide. "Mmm?" He blinked, wrapping his hands around his cup. "What?"

"How're you feeling?" She smiled at him. "I know that's a bit of a silly question, but-"

"I'm fine." He cut in. "Just...weird."

"Weird? How?"

Adam looked around, frowning a little, cup held against his mouth as if he was trying to hide behind it. "...Feels wrong." He said at last. "...Mam and Daid should be here."

The social worker just nodded. What else could she do? The boy was just...staring at the table, holding his cup, his eyes dry.

Poor little mite. 


End file.
